Moral Arrogance

Last week on the radio program This American Life they had a story about Carlton Pearson, a fundamentalist Christian preacher who, one day, stopped believing in hell.  He lost his congregation of thousands and was ostracized from the evangelical community.  Everyone turned their backs on him – but he was convinced that the only hell was what we created for ourselves here on earth.  And since there was no hell, everyone was going to heaven.  And since everyone is going to heaven, there is no need to obey the bible or even believe in god.  It is a fascinating story, and you can listen to it for free on their website. 

It made me think about hell – and what it means to most religions.  There are plenty of religions that don’t have hell (Unitarianism, Judaism, et al.).  That being said, most mainstream Christians do believe in its existence.  Many claim it is why they act morally – to avoid roasting forever in the fiery pits. 

The idea that there is a place that you go as punishment for behaving badly means that for Christians, morality is objective.  This means that there are right and wrong actions, that there are no grey areas.  Nothing is ‘rightish’ or ‘wrongish’.  Your deeds either count for you or against you. 

Ted Haggard (yes, that Ted Haggard) accused Richard Dawkins of being intellectually arrogant.  But is there anyone more arrogant than religious people?  Moral arrogance is one of the most fundamental concepts of the fundamentalist movement in America.  We’re right, you’re wrong (unless you become like us). 

And what is most frustrating is that this is the very thing that makes it impossible to have an intellectual argument with a person of extreme religious conviction.  You can argue all you want why it is illogical to believe in god – and it won’t matter because the religious mind has decided that god exists, independently of reason.  A moral absolutist is unlikely to change their opinions about the morality of certain acts (I doubt Ted Haggard is going to become a gay rights activist anytime soon) for the same reason, their mind is already made. 

It takes the kind of revelation that compelled Carlton Pearson to change his mind about Hell to alter the mind set of devout Christians – no amount of argument will do it.  The trouble is, I am not sure if there is any way the reasonable among us can inspire this kind of transformation. 

Moral absolutists think that without right and wrong absolutes the world would descend into chaos.  As Shakespeare once wrote, ‘nothing is either good nor bad but thinking makes it so.”  Good and Evil are simply a short hand way of describing how we feel about things. 

I suppose this upsets me so because as an outspoken atheistic individual, I’ve often been accused of this so called ‘intellectual arrogance‘.  And I also think that moral arrogance – moral absolutism – is one of the most dangerous parts of religion.  This is why politicians and judges and juries – none of them – should be religious.  I also think that this is primarily why some religious people find me offensive – their moral absolutes are not up for debate in their minds. 

 Nothing is sacred – neither good nor bad.